Mexico

There are several reasons for the slipperiness of the subject. First of all, it is a very big country. You could easily lose Belgium somewhere in it. The single state of Veracruz is bigger than Italy, and it is only one state of the federation.

Then, it is multicultural. There are many indigenous people and cultures, the cities are very different from the countryside. There are mountain people, desert dwellers, sailors ...

Basically, whenever some tells you "I know all about Mexico" he is bullshitting you. At most, one can know something about it, and again only at a particular time - things change fast. The Mexico of General Cardenas was vastly different from today's country in many things. Of course, for the Huichol not much has changed - but Mexico City became about ten times bigger !

We are doomed to incompleteness. I now realize that this is true for many subjects, only for Mexico more so.

So, let us start:

My personal Mexico

Truly Mexico is a place of opposites.

Mexicans travel in peseros, and practice Mexican democracy.

Mexico introduced me to hot food, taught me the beauty of violently saturated colors, and violently saturated fats.

Mexico made me a boss, and I hope it does not unmake me soon.

Outside Mexico City, I know Veracruz, Oaxaca, Queretaro, Guanajuato, Pachuca, San Luis Potosí, and Villahermosa. I also visited Cancun, but I was not happy about it.

The Mexican newspaper I read is La Jornada, and at times Reforma. Mexican TV I mostly avoid, although the wrestling matches could have some surreality interest.

As a background, I have the volcanos: the Popocatépetl and the Iztaccihuatl. Of course, only when they are visible. Pollution is quite strong. On bad days, the sky is gray and you can't even see the Ajusco, let alone the volcanos.

Fun activities that I engage in

When they ask me for the US Consulate or Embassy, I route them (with the help of a friendly taxi driver) to the Mexican Forestry and Hamster-Powered Devices Office where they will be eaten alive by secretaries and rabid hamsters.

To the would-be cool dudes from New York, I sell dried epazote under the guise of grass. And I am not making a profit on that, since ganja in Mexico is very cheap; it is just an effect of my spiteful nature.
When I feel just mildly nasty I simply tell them to go to Cancun - that is punishment enough.

I eat tortas in torta stands (the cheapest are at UNAM). Every now and then, a little trip to Oaxaca. I have a giant statue of Benito Juarez, with laser eyes !

Mexico. A country of south-central North America. Inhabited in pre-Columbian times by the Aztecs and Maya among others. The Spanish arrived in Mexico around 1500 and immediately set out to steal, rape and burn everything in sight. Mexico was conquered by Cortés in 1521 and held by the Spanish until 1821. The spanish brought many diseases to Mexico, and the American continent, such as Syphillis. When this war ended, the spanish had also destroyed most of the religion and culture that existed in the country, to impose their own christian beliefs.

Mexico was at that point still larger than Brazil, but the United States found a way to steal most of the lands located north of the Rio Bravo. It was called the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. It was either that or full out war between the U.S. and Mexico. Texas, California and many others were lost to the U.S. in this way. Mexico City is the capital and the largest city. There is a lot of crime. Population at last count was about 97,395,826, probably larger today.

Salma Hayek is from Mexico.

So is Ricardo Castillo.

So am I.

"The spanish brought many diseases to Mexico, and the american continent, such as Syphillis." For the sake of accuracy, this statement should not go unchallenged.

The best evidence available to date shows that while the Europeans may have, and in fact did, bring a host of illnesses to the Americas, syphillis was not one of them. The historical and anthropological evidence suggests that syphillis was a disease that was native to the Americas, and was transmitted TO Europeans, not the other way around.

I refer the kind reader to the book Guns, Germs and Steel, by Jared Diamond, for a fascinating discussion of the exchange of diseases between the "old world" and the "new world."

Most respectfully,

Dogboy

Mexico's official name is the United Mexican States. There are 32 states, including a federal district. Below is a list of the state capital, followed by the abbreviation in parentheses, and then the capital of the state.

State                (Abbr.)    Capital 
Aguascalientes       (Ags.)     Aguascalientes
Baja California      (B.C.)     Mexicali
Baja California Sur  (B.C.S.)   La Paz 
Campeche             (Camp.)    Campeche
Chiapas              (Chis.)    Tuxtla Gutiérrez
Chihuahua            (Chih.)    Chihuahua
Coahuila             (Coah.)    Saltillo
Colima               (Col.)     Colima
Distrito Federal     (D.F.)     Mexico City 
Durango              (Dgo.)     Durango 
Guanajuato           (Gto.)     Guanajuato
Guerrero             (Gro.)     Chilpancingo
Hidalgo              (Hgo.)     Pachuca
Jalisco              (Jal.)     Guadalajara
Mexico               (Mex.)     Toluca
Michoacán            (Mich.)    Morelia
Morelos              (Mor.)     Cuernavaca
Nayarit              (Nay.)     Tepic
Nuevo León           (N.L.)     Monterrey 
Oaxaca               (Oax.)     Oaxaca
Puebla               (Pue.)     Puebla
Querétaro            (Qro.)     Querétaro 
Quintana Roo         (Q.R.)     Chetumal
San Luis Potosí      (S.L.P.)   San Luis Potosí
Sinaloa              (Sin.)     Culiacán
Sonora               (Son.)     Hermosillo
Tabasco              (Tab.)     Villahermosa
Tamaulipas           (Tamps.)   Ciudad Victoria
Tlaxcala             (Tlax.)    Tlaxcala 
Veracruz             (Ver.)     Jalapa
Yucatán              (Yuc.)     Mérida 
Zacatecas            (Zac.)     Zacatecas 

• Randomly choose someone to go first. They shake the dice in the cup and slams it down on the table, so that no one can see the roll.

• The roller then announces their roll. They can tell the truth, or bluff. Except for a one and two, or doubles, values of the rolls are determined by the higher die being the tens, and the lower die being the ones. E.g., a 3 and a 6 would be "63."

• Double 2s, 3s, 4s, 5s, or 6s, are worth 200, 300, 400, 500 and 600, respectively. Double 1 and 2 is the second highest roll, double 1s is the highest. Both of these have special rules associated with them, explained later.

• The next player can then choose to call their bluff or roll themselves. If they choose to roll, they repeat the procedure just described, except that whatever they call, it must be higher than the preceeding roll. If they roll lower than the preceeding roll, they must bluff. It is advised to think of a bluff before you roll, because rolling, seeing that you got lower, and then thinking for several seconds to come up with a bluff is a dead giveaway.

• Play continues this way until someone calls a bluff. At that point, the dice are revealed. If the roller was bluffing, he must drink (we play with a third of a beer = one drink, but this can be adjusted). If he was telling the truth, the person who called his bluff must drink.

• A one and a two is "Mexico." It's the second highest roll, and calling it (whether or not you're bluffing) reverses the direction of play. Therefore, the person who rolled just before you must then either call your bluff or decide to roll. Note that if they decide to roll, they're going to have to call double 1s, no matter what, since that's the only roll higher than Mexico.

• Double ones are the highest roll. Obviously, the next person would not be able to roll higher, so ordinarily, they would automatically call your bluff. To compensate for this, there is the following special rule: the consequences for calling a bluff on double ones are doubled. If you call double ones, the next player can either bite the bullet and take one drink, or call your bluff. If they call your bluff and you were lying, you drink once, and they may assign one extra drink to anyone they want. If they call your bluff and you were telling the truth, they have to drink twice.

• After a bluff is called, play restarts. The person who called the bluff rolls the dice, and may call any roll.

• Dropping the dice out of the cup: Drink once for every die that escapes. Then reroll. Play continues as usual.

• Calling a roll that doesn't exist (e.g. calling "35" on a 3 and 5, instead of "53"): Drink once, and pass the dice to the next player. Play restarts (as if a bluff had been called).

Like any drinking game, this game can get you very drunk if the specified volume per "drink" is high enough. Start low, and work your way up until you find the amount that works for your group of friends.

I've heard of people making this game more complicated by inventing special rules for other rolls of the dice aside from 1-2 and double ones (e.g. skip the next player, reverse the order of rolls so that you now must roll lower than the preceeding player, etc.), but I've only played it with the basic rules given here.